Offenders on probation kill or commit sex attacks three times a week

Revealed: Three murders or sex attacks are carried out every week by criminals on probation which Labour claims shows a system ‘in chaos’

• Nearly 700 convictions for murder given to criminals on probation since 2010
• Yesterday Lee Peacock found guilty of murdering girlfriend after jail release 

Three murders or serious sex crimes are committed every week by offenders on probation.

Nearly 700 convictions for murder have been handed to criminals who were on probation since 2010 – an average of one a week.

And a further 950 convictions for rape, attempted rape or serious sex assaults – including attacks on young children – have been secured against known offenders in that time.

The figures were revealed as a ‘warped and angry’ killer was yesterday found guilty of murdering his girlfriend and an associate within weeks of being released from jail.

A review published last week found a series of failures in the way probation teams handled violent thug Jordan McSweeney (pictured), who went on to murder Zara Aleena

Similar disturbing failures were highlighted in another inquiry, published two weeks ago, into the handling of killer rapist Damien Bendall (pictured)

The Labour Party, which obtained the crime figures, said the data showed the probation service was ‘in chaos’. It blamed the Government for failing to invest in the system.

In total, there were 3,219 ‘serious further offences’ committed by known criminals on probation in England and Wales between 2010-11 and 2020-21.

Some will have been committed by offenders who were on licence after previously committing other serious crimes, while others were deemed to be lower-risk offenders.

The convictions included kidnapping, attempted murder and arson with intent to endanger life. In all, there has been an average of six serious further offences a week committed by criminals on probation over the 11-year period.

Labour justice spokesman Steve Reed said: ‘Murderers and rapists must not be left to roam the streets and prey on new victims. Thirteen years of Conservative mismanagement has left our probation services in chaos… The service has been left facing a shortage of staff, unmanageable workloads, and morale is at rock bottom.’

It comes after a review published last week found a series of failures in the way probation teams handled violent thug Jordan McSweeney, who went on to murder Zara Aleena.

Freed to slash pair’s throats 

By Daily Mail Reporter

A ‘warped’ killer was yesterday convicted of murdering his girlfriend and a man within weeks of being released from jail.

Lee Peacock, 50, cut the throats of his partner Sharon Pickles, 46, and Clinton Ashmore, 59, during a violent two-day spree in west London in August 2021, the Old Bailey heard.

The burglar, from Westminster, tried to turn his knife on himself when police tracked him down to a houseboat on the Grand Union Canal after a five-day manhunt. Prosecutor Edward Brown KC said the killings happened while Peacock was out on licence. The defendant had a background of drugs and a ‘significant criminal history’, although it was not consistent with a history of offences of violence, the prosecutor said.

Detective Chief Inspector Wayne Jolley said Peacock was ‘determined to blame others’ for his partner’s decision to move on with her life while he was in jail.

He is due to be sentenced this morning.

Lee Peacock, 50, cut the throats of his partner Sharon Pickles, 46, and Clinton Ashmore, 59

McSweeney should have been recalled to prison six days before the attack but delays meant he was roaming the streets free to kill the 35-year-old aspiring lawyer.

Similar disturbing failures were highlighted in another inquiry, published two weeks ago, into the handling of killer rapist Damien Bendall.

Errors by probation officers meant Bendall was left free to murder his pregnant partner Terri Harris and three children – her 11-year-old daughter Lacey Bennett, her son John Paul Bennett, 13, and Lacey’s friend Connie Gent, 11.

Both McSweeney and Bendall had been wrongly categorised as ‘medium risk’ rather than ‘high risk’.

It came as a whistleblower last night claimed probation officers are under ‘organisational pressure’ to allocate lower risk ratings to offenders.

The anonymous source told Channel 4 News: ‘The more complex and riskier cases, the more resources allocated to it.

‘There is some organisational pressure to lower the risk rating because you can pass more cases on to a person if they are less resource heavy.’

The senior civil servant at the Ministry of Justice, Antonia Romeo, told MPs yesterday she wanted to ensure ‘that we’re completely learning lessons from everything that has happened’ so that ‘these appalling crimes don’t happen again’.

The permanent secretary told the Commons’ justice select committee she was ‘profoundly sorry’ for the errors in the McSweeney and Bendall cases.

Amy Rees, director general of HM Prison and Probation Service, said both cases had been ‘allocated to an inexperienced probation officer’. 

Labour said there was a ‘sharp increase’ in serious further offence convictions following the botched probation privatisation in 2014. It was renationalised in 2019.

A Conservative source said: ‘If the Labour Party were serious about locking up violent criminals, then they would have voted for our Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act. Labour have put politics before tackling crime – they have consistently voted for weaker jail sentences, fewer powers for the police and less money for our brave police.’

The Government is investing an extra £155million in probation, including the recruitment of 4,000 probation officers, and has outlined plans to overhaul the parole system.

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